Day: December 23, 2005

“St. Louis scientists say they’ve determined how HIV invades healthy cells — and that could lead to improved drug therapies to fight the deadly disease.

“The researchers at the Saint Louis University Institute for Molecular Virology demonstrated the molecular mechanism by which the HIV virus infects, or integrates, healthy cells.

“Although scientists theorized two ends of the virus’ DNA must come together inside a healthy cell to infect it, until now investigators haven’t been able to illuminate the process.

“Many biological and structural aspects of HIV integration are undefined,” said Sibes Bera, one of the investigators. ‘Therefore, any insight into the molecular mechanism of this process is significant in developing integrase inhibitors.'”